Lamentation of the forgotten SPLM/SPLA freedom fighters in Salva Kiir’s South Sudan
“The conversation turns to current events and growing discontent with the SPLM-led government. They laugh darkly about the recent speeches during the late General Bior Ajang Duot (Aswuot) prayer in Juba, that ensued after it was revealed that South Sudan had turned away from its freedom fighters (veterans).”
By Tito Tong John, Juba, South Sudan
Wednesday, 11 September 2024 (PW) — Here I would love to share with you an amazing view of a great veteran who lamented about their liberation contribution during the SPLA moment. What Dengdit remembers most about his sixteenth birthday is the sound of the gun a deafening crack slicing through the hot afternoon air in his home town Wau of Western Bhar el Ghazal.
It was 1985, and Dengdit was at a guerilla training camp in Bilpham on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s largest city. He gripped the semi-automatic rifle he’d been issued and fixed his gaze on the inky silhouette of a paper target.
Nearby, rows of fighters marched in time to the staccato cries of a drill instructor. Salty sweat dripped from every brow and yellow dirt crunched under every boot. Dengdit was thousands of miles away from his native hometown, the farthest he’d ever been from home.
Most of the soldiers at the camp were young men the youngest just 13 years old and they’d come from different regions of Southern Sudan, some from the urban towns of Bhar el Ghazal, some from the Upper Nile and others from the Equatoria. But whether young or old, city dweller or bushman, they were united by their shared purpose, their shared dream a free South Sudan.
Although he had never held a gun before, Dengdit learned quickly. Unlike many of his young comrades, Dengdit was naturally gifted, with the stereotypical build of a soldier tall, broad shouldered, with long muscular arms. Only the smoothness of his face betrayed his tender age. As he squeezed off rounds, Dengdit imagined that each paper target was the sneering face of an Arab regime officer. He rarely missed.
Like thousands of young men and women, Dengdit fled his homeland in order to fight the Arab regime that had oppressed black Southern Sudanese through institutionalized racism since 1956. In Ethiopia, he joined the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), a militarized wing of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), with one goal in mind: destroy the system that treated black Southern Sudanese as less than human. The movement attracted a flood of idealistic youth.
Over the next three years, Dengdit set foot on his native soil only during military strikes orchestrated by SPLA. He had no contact with family or friends. He didn’t even know if they were alive.
“I was willing to sacrifice my life for my people,” said Dengdit. “We were fighting an unjust system.” But more than two decades after the CPA signed, Dengdit still feels that he is fighting an unjust system, one that refuses to compensate him for the sacrifices he made.
Dengdit, now 53 years old lives alone in his home village Nyin-Akok of Western Bhar el Ghazal, a sleepy town with a population of just over 2,000. Although his face has lost its youthful smoothness over the years, he still carries his muscular frame with a militant confidence and alertness.
Dengdit’s home is a thatched roof house, a round hut made of local materials, on another man’s farmland. The house has no running water or electricity. The nearest shop or petrol station is more than three hours walk across a Jur-River bridge that spans a dry riverbed.
The small amount of money Dengdit has to his name he gets from odd jobs, which rarely earn him enough for the 5,000 SSP ($1) it costs to take a motor bike to Eastern Jur river bridge. He gets just small to buy meals for a meager table. And yet, Dengdit considers himself one of the lucky one.
“We were young and idealistic,” he says. Dengdit speaks slowly and expressively, but his eyes have a strange intensity that is, at times, unsettling. “I thought ending Arab regime would end our suffering it just changed it.” He cried out to the government officials to heed to his message to give a hand or take care of the veterans.
Dengdit says veterans like him who took part in the anti-Arab struggle are suffering because the SPLM-led government failed to deliver on services it promised. There are more than 16,000 military veterans residing in South Sudan without proper services. Many of the young men Dengdit trained with in Ethiopia are now unemployed, homeless, incarcerated or dead.
“Promises have been made that we’re going to be given housing,” says Dengdit. “We’re not asking for double story houses, triple story houses just basic housing, basic education and a basic livelihood.”
The conversation turns to current events and growing discontent with the SPLM-led government. They laugh darkly about the recent speeches during the late General Bior Ajang Duot (Aswuot) prayer in Juba, that ensued after it was revealed that South Sudan had turn away from its freedom fighters (veterans). He added that, around 11 million of South Sudan’s population lives in poverty line. Dengdit is among the discussed population mentioned in the article.
In conclusion, “I still don’t have a house, I don’t earn a salary,” says Dengdit. “I survive. I just survive.” As the light fades, the men stand to say their goodbyes. It’s raining in South Sudan and the sun sets surprisingly quickly. Soon, it’s difficult to make out the men’s faces, only the dusky outlines of their heads and shoulders like paper targets.
The author, Tito Tong has a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa in Nairobi, Kenya. He is pursuing a Master of Business Administration with a specialisation in Human Resources Management at the same institution. Before this, he worked with various radio institutions under the Catholic Radio Network in South Sudan. He now writes opinion pieces for the Dawn News Paper and PaanLuel Wël regularly. To contact him, you can reach him at his email address: tongkhamisa446@gmail.com.
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